


you and i (for the last time)

by irreputablyyours



Category: Music RPF, Oasis (Band)
Genre: Angst, M/M, Songfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-18
Updated: 2021-01-18
Packaged: 2021-03-16 17:07:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,583
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28834617
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/irreputablyyours/pseuds/irreputablyyours
Summary: Liam could never quite figure out how to tell his brother he loved him.(Or: One Of Us songfic)
Relationships: Liam Gallagher/Noel Gallagher
Comments: 7
Kudos: 23





	you and i (for the last time)

**Author's Note:**

> _Hey kid did you know, today sixteen years ago, it was you and I for the last time?_  
>  \- Liam Gallagher. One Of Us, August 16th, 2019
> 
> Am I the only person who is absolutely mystified by that line? I know [some people](https://genius.com/Liam-gallagher-one-of-us-lyrics) say it's about that time in 2002 where Sara purportedly took Noel's passport, but I mean last time I checked 2019-16=2003, and that still leaves at least six months missing. Hence, fic. Also, [the video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V3mhhT3c7oY) kind of broke my heart, so...here you go I guess lol.

_2003_

The sunlight’s filtering through the hotel window, golden and refracting in the early hours of dawn. Liam rubs his eyes; it’s maybe seven, which is too early by miles, but he gets up anyways. The first few months after a tour always leave him jittery: restless with energy, like he should be doing something, somewhere, at all times.

Noel’s still dead asleep. He always looks less stressed like that, like someone’s taken the weight of the world off of his shoulders, and Liam can’t help but smile down at him. He brushes the hair from his brother’s face and reaches out to pull the sheets back up, stopping when he notices the purple mark on Noel’s collarbone. Fuck, he’s going to be mad about that. _Sara’ll notice, Liam, stop acting like it’s the fucking nineties and we’re both coked up to the eyeballs._

Liam hadn’t done cocaine last night, but he’d sure as fuck been high on _something,_ calling Noel up at nine in the evening to tell him Liam’d got a hotel room booked and he should tell his missus he was running out for a night with his mates. Noel’d listened to him mention the address, called him a cunt and hung up, and Liam had resigned himself to a night in with his right hand.

Not thirty minutes later, though, Noel had been stood at the door, this strange desperate look in his eyes. He’d kissed Liam like it was the end of the fucking world, shoving him up against the wall and catching him in a bruising kiss. Liam touches his lips, thinking that they still felt raw.

Usually they only did this type of stuff on tours. It’s blinding, being on tour – the whole of reality fades in a fucking haze of crowds and concerts and drugs and sex – Liam thinks it’s easier for Noel that way.

Liam calls room service and tells them to bring up “Some kind of meal, I think. Toast, maybe with eggs or jam or summat,” and leave it outside the room, because Noel’d lose his fucking mind if someone saw them.

He fetches breakfast and sits down on the couch, one leg sprawled over the armrest, the plate balancing precariously on his thigh. He thinks of reaching for the telly remote, but the truth is he doesn’t much feel like football today. Instead, he’s tapping his finger to some unknown beat – it’s a bit faster than Live Forever. The words _you and I_ keep playing over in his head, for some reason. He dismisses it, catching the tune and twisting it back into the familiar song as he eats his toast.

Eventually he gives in, turning on the telly even though he’s not much in the mood for it, flipping past the news and dramas and sitcoms.

Noel stumbles out of the bedroom maybe an hour later, hair mussed up. He takes one look at Liam. His jaw’s set in a hard line, and Liam tries not to sigh. Bad news.

“This has to stop.” He says.

Liam frowns, glancing at the telly, purposely obtuse. “I mean, I think this match was pretty good. City won-”

Noel frowns, his teeth digging into his lower lip. “No, you fucking knobhead. _Us._ You and I. It has to stop.” He rummages through his already-packed back, digging out his cellphone. Sighing, he pushes a hand through his hair. “Sara left me a message. The way she talked...” His expression is drawn into concern, like...

“You think she _knows?_ ” Liam almost laughs.

Noel doesn’t seem to find it so funny. “No, but she – Liam, if she finds out I’ll lose her.” His voice sounds strained, and when Liam looks up there’s genuine worry in his expression.

Liam raises an eyebrow. “So?”

“So? I love her!”

“Who fucking cares? You love me more,” he says, eyes dropping to the still-visible mark on Noel’s collarbone. Noel follows his gaze, hand going to cover the mark like he’s been burned. His other hand clenches into a fist, and he averts his gaze. Shame, that’s what it is in his eyes. He knows what Liam said is true, and the fucker’s ashamed of it. Course.

“This-” Noel looks back up, waving his hand around the room, probably trying to encompass what he views as _them:_ coked-up late nights in hotels, quick handjobs in grimy public bathrooms. Dirty laundry. “-Has to end. We can’t be – we can’t be everything, Liam.”

“Why not?” Liam knows, in the same way he knows Noel’s songs the first time he hears them, that him and Noel are better together. Each one of the ways they love each other is an extension of another – different strings that tie them together in some type of fucking inescapably complicated tapestry, the type of thing that no one else could understand even if they had a fucking handbook. They’re better for it, too. Liam never wants to cut the strings, act fucking _normal_ like Noel pretends to want them to be. Liam'll kiss his brother in front of everyone, no holds barred. So what? They don't get it. 

“Because one day we’re going to get caught, and it’s going to ruin our fucking lives!” Noel storms right up to Liam, towering over him, for once. His eyes shadowy, the way they always get when he wants a fight, when he's mad as all hell.

“We kissed in front of 80, 000 fucking people, and no one gave a fuck-”

“But one day they will!”

“Why?” Liam says incredulously.

Noel pauses. His shoulders drop, and he looks down at the floor. “I was going to have a romantic dinner with Sara. Take her out, do it nicely and all that. Give her chocolates and flowers.” He looks up. “I’d been planning it for weeks. And then, when you called me up – it was like,” he makes a fist, and Liam tenses up, but he’s not throwing punches quite yet, “Like I had to. Like the sheer fact that it was _you_ made it important.” He bites his lip so hard he draws blood. Liam wants to reaches up and wipe it away, pull him down, kiss him until they both taste like the stupid posh blueberry jam Liam’d had with his toast.

He reaches up to touch him. Noel snatches his wrist, his grip so tight he’s cutting the circulation. Disappointment lights in his eyes, followed by anger. “You don’t fucking get it, do you? I don’t know why the fuck I expected you to.”

He drops Liam’s wrist, leaning down. Pressing two fingers to Liam’s chin, tilts his head up and kisses him. He grabs his bag.

“That was the last time.”

He walks out the door, slamming it shut behind him.

*

_2009_

“You’re fucking leaving? Just like that?” Red’s gotten everywhere – a gash oozing blood on Liam’s hand and shattered pieces of a guitar on the floor.

“Yeah, you fucking cunt, and you won’t catch me coming back.” Noel glares at Liam, so mad he’s shaking. He’s so close – Liam could kiss him, if he wanted to. He’d done it once in back in 2005. Noel’d looked so happy Liam hadn’t been able to help it, and afterwards his mind had been whispering _maybe maybe maybe_ for days. Sara must’ve somehow been more important, though, because Noel’d never mentioned it again.

Instead of doing any of that, Liam balls his hands into fists. His fingers twitch and he thinks about hitting his brother. He doesn’t, though, just looks at Noel, as though fifteen seconds might be enough to read every emotion his brother’s ever had, as though Noel was somehow telepathic and Liam could fit every thought he’s had about him into those short seconds.

Noel’s eyes drop to Liam’s mouth. He bites his lips, looks away. He’s wrought with tension, like a guitar string about to snap, but he doesn’t do it – doesn’t punch Liam, doesn’t kiss him.

“I fucking hate you,” he whispers, in the same way he used to say _I need you._

“Well, go on then,” Liam says, nodding toward the door. He knows he sounds angry, know he’ll regret saying it the moment Noel leaves. Doesn’t stop him, though. Never has.

Noel glances towards the door, grabbing Liam’s hand and digging his nails into the wound. Liam grits his teeth.

“I fucking hate you,” Noel says again.

“I know,” Liam says. He’s so fucking sick of this. He’s so fucking sick of Noel, sick of hating him and sick of loving him and sick of knowing that Noel won’t risk anything for him, not a single thing. “Go on, fuck off to your bitch wife and pretend you never loved me.”

Noel’s eyes go wide, his expression going from shock to anger in a nanosecond. Maybe _his_ memory’s shot, but Liam’s isn’t. Liam can remember a time when the two of them tossed around the l-word like it was candy.

“See you in fucking Hell,” Noel spits out. He strides out the room. The door slams behind him. It echoes. Suddenly, Liam’s back in 2003, for just a split-second. He can tell, in the same unspoken way he did then, that it’s over. For good.

He still doesn’t understand why Noel had left then. Doesn’t think that he’ll understand this, either.

He stands there, in the ashes of the last seventeen years. “Love you,” he mumbles to no one.

There’s that same beat – he could swear it’s familiar, but he can’t remember from what. _You said that you’d see me on the other side,_ comes to him, a low lyric filled with pain. He can’t make himself sing it. Doesn’t want to.

He storms off to the pub, more than ready to get so pissed he forgets his last name.

*

_2019_

Liam doesn’t ever really sit down and think to himself, ‘Okay, today I’m gonna write a song.’ He didn’t do that when he was in Oasis, he didn’t do it when he wrote his first album, and he’s not planning on starting now. Usually, he’ll get a line in his head that refuses to leave, rap his knuckles to the beat, scrawl down some lyrics – usually a chorus, sometimes a verse. He’ll let it roll around in his head for a bit, sing the chorus, and then send it off to Damon or Andrew, make some changes to their stuff, and do the revised version in studio. It’s nothing like the type of magic that used to happen in the studio when Noel would play for him, but he tries not to think about that.

He finds himself tapping a beat, humming under his breath, _I can be sure like never before, this time..._

He still can’t figure out why Noel left him, the cunt. His songs would be better if Liam was singing them. Some part of Liam thinks they’re hardwired for it, that he and Noel get each other – musically, whatever, - in a way that no one else does. He memorises Noel’s songs faster than he memorises his own.

Fuck, he thinks, staring off in the distance. The city’s a haze of fog today, like someone’s dropped him in the middle of a fucking smokestack. He wants to swat at it, clear the way.

In his head he’s back in 2009, Noel telling him he’d see Liam in Hell, Liam standing in a pub hours later with alcohol on his breath and regret tasting bitter in his mouth.

The beat he’s tapping has changed - he’s not humming Noel’s song anymore. He’s thinking back to that day, how it’s been nearly a decade and he still can’t shake the words _you said that you would see me on the other side_ from his head.

He thinks of the fog around him, blinding his vision, _you said it with a smoke ring around your head –_ that could rhyme, if you broke it up on _said._ He hums to himself, trying to string together a melody.

That’d been what it was like, when Noel was with Sara. Like she fucking – fucking cast a spell over him, blinded him with her uppity personality or something. He forgave her for everything – the last time they’d fucked, it’d been less than a year since she’d stolen Noel’s passport and nearly ruined their tour. And yet she was somehow more important than Liam. Somehow.

He realises his hands have curled into fists, nearly drawing blood. Twenty years ago, he would’ve gone to a pub and got into a brawl and probably lost a tooth or two. As it is, he walks into a café and orders a tea, nicks a pen, sits down and scribbles down his lyrics on a napkin.

His phone rings – Twitter message, probably. He glances at it, barely catching the date. It’s March, now. When had that last time been? He remembers it was August, maybe about halfway through...the sixteenth. If he really puts his mind to it, he can release the song on that day.

He can’t help but grin, even if it’s sad and bitter. It’d be the one thing only Noel would get, only him and Noel.

He scribbles down a few more lyrics, and within fifteen minutes he’s got a half-baked draft for the verses. The melody for the chorus is pretty good – he can already hear how it’ll sound, in his mind.

 _You said we’d live forever –_ fuck, he’d been singing that song when Noel came out of the bedroom to tell him it was over, hadn’t he? Would Noel remember that?

He scrawls out some filler lines because for the life of him he can’t think of anything that rhymes with _forever_ and doesn’t sound like shit. By the time he’s at the end of the chorus, he’s only got one other line he likes - _in time, I’m gonna make you mine._

He stares at it for a long time, feeling sadness expand and contract in his chest, a weight he can never quite shake. When he goes to take a swig of tea, he nearly knocks his cup over.

He puts a slash through the last part in big black ink, and shoves the paper into his pocket.

/

Liam fucking hates the song title. _One Of Us._ Noel isn’t ‘one of them’. Noel is _Liam’s_ – no one else’s. He’s struck with a desire to scribble all over the line, cross it out in fucking red ink, write _WRONG_ in big block letters.

Contrary to what Noel says, though, Liam does have some common sense. He’s learned a thing or two about plausible deniability, over the years.

He tells them to put the song out on August 16th; no one asks him why, although Debbie shoots him a questioning look. He thinks of telling her: _it’ll mean something to Noel._ He thinks of telling her everything, just because sometimes it feels like big fucking _thing_ that he’s got to carry around with him, like he’s worse than a fucking murderer just because he loved his brother too much. Sometimes he just wants to fucking _scream_ it: _Noel, I love you_ , at the top of his lungs – in an interview, in a concert, to the whole fucking world.

This is probably as close as he’ll ever get. He can’t tell the world, but Noel will get it.

Or maybe he won’t, Liam thinks, staring out the window onto the setting sun. He could never quite figure out how to tell his brother he loved him.

**Author's Note:**

> The [Heathen Chemistry](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heathen_Chemistry_Tour) tour ended on March 12th, 2003. Liam [claims](https://www.nme.com/news/music/liam-gallagher-noels-wife-reason-oasis-2250401) that Sara stole Noel's passport just before the American leg of the tour, when it went [missing](http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/2168404.stm). Liam had[ cowriters](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_of_Us_\(Liam_Gallagher_song\)) Damon McMahon and Andrew Wyatt helping him write the song. Liam [has stated](https://www.nme.com/news/music/liam-gallagher-oasis-reunion-better-together-2122046) that he and Noel are 'better together'. The bit about Liam being able to play back Noel's songs after having heard them only once is from _Supersonic_ (2016). And [here's](https://irreputablyyours.tumblr.com/post/640532162056273920/2005-q-awards) Noel and Liam during the 2005 Q Awards.
> 
> As always feedback is love, talk to me here or on tumblr, etc. (:


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